It turns out grifters operating in Australia have moved on from small-time marks, to straight-up siphoning hundreds of thousands of dollars from the state’s councils. Poor ol’ Townsville is no exception.
Following Brisbane’s v. unfortunate victimisation by scammers earlier this year – which resulted in the state’s capital essentially coughing up $450,000 to crims – Townsville’s Mayor Jenny Hill today said $294,000 had been transferred to con artists posing as a legitimate engineering firm.
The crooks responsible for the swindle crafted invoices said to look identical to official financial documents, and deployed them to great affect back in April.
Police, the Queensland Audit Office, and national watchdog Scam Alert were clued in as soon as the discrepancy was spotted.
Hill said the council has “been advised that the scammers are suspected to be from overseas, and recovering the money is unlikely…
This type of crime is becoming extremely sophisticated and all councils in Queensland are on red alert.”
ABC reports the councils of Ipswich, Logan, Moreton Bay, the Sunshine Coast, and Bundaberg had also been targeted by the scam, but the fraud was spotted there before any payments were made.
Just as well – $750k is already far too bloody much to be snatched away by the sneaky bottom-feeders of organised crime.
Source: ABC / Townsville Bulletin.
Photo: @chemodiver / Instagram.
